FIDE World Cup, Preliminary Round

So, even though the Carlsen-Nepomniachtchi match hasn't started yet, the qualification process to determine who will be in the next World Championship match is already under way. Joining the loser of that match and Radjabov (who withdrew from the last Candidates for COVID-related reasons) in the Candidates will be two players from the World Cup, two from the Grand Swiss, and two from the Grand Prix. 

  The  World Cup is, this time around, increased to 206 participants from its previous 128, with the top 50 seeds going straight into the round of 128 and the other 156 playing in a preliminary round. Apart from that change, the format is the same as in previous years: a seeded knockout with two-game mini-matches; matches that finish 1-1 go on to tie-break matches at progressively faster time controls. At the end of it, the two finalists are the qualifiers, and all the quarter-finalists who don't reach the final qualify for the Grand Prix.

Or, at least, that's what would happen in normal circumstances. However, normal circumstances are slightly interrupted by the fact that Magnus Carlsen has decided to enter the World Cup. Why he's decided to enter a tournament whose main purpose is to serve as a qualifier for an event he's already qualified for is up to him, but it will mean that if he reaches the final, the two qualifiers will be his opponent in the final and the winner of the third-place playoff.

Carlsen's presence, as top seed, has some interesting knock-on effects: it puts the two players who would otherwise be the top two seeds, Caruana and Aronian, into the same half of the draw, and it similarly puts the player who would otherwise be 8th seed, Dominguez, into a collision course with the now 8th seed Firoujza for a place in the all-important quarter-finals. I'm not convinced that having Carlsen in your tournament is worth this sort of competitive disruption, but hey ho.

So what about the chess itself? Well, most of the preliminary round pairings have gone with seeding, but not all: British interest in the event has been maintained by our sole representative, Ravi Haria (England, seed 169), getting through in the tie-break games against Vadim Zvjaginsev (Russia, seed 88). He now goes on to play seed 41, Etienne Bacrot of France. The other successful giant-killers were Jahongir Vakhidov of Uzbekistan, Juraj Druska of Slovakia, Panneerselvam Iniyan of India, Guillermo Vasquez of Paraguay, Abdelrahman Hesham of Egypt, Volodar Murzin of Russia, Shamsiddin Vokhidov of Uzbekistan and Vojtěch Plát of the Czech Republic.

 




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